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The Internet

The Privatization of Copyright Lawmaking 213

Posted by Soulskill from the outsourcing-a-job-nobody-wants dept.
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from TorrentFreak: "The biggest misperception about [the Stop Online Piracy Act] is that it is somehow unprecedented or extraordinary. It is not. SOPA represents just the latest example of copyright law defined and controlled not by the government but by private entities. Copyright owners will deploy SOPA in the same way they have behaved in the past: to extend out their rights. They will disrupt sites that do not infringe a copyright, interfere with fair uses of copyrighted works, and take other steps that evade the limits that the Copyright Act sets on a copyright owner's actual rights."
The Internet

Warner Brothers: Automated Takedown Notices Hit Files That Weren't Ours 157

Posted by timothy from the let-god-sort-'em-out dept.
itwbennett writes "In a court case between Hotfile.com and Hollywood studios, Warner Brothers admitted they sent takedown orders for thousands of files they didn't own or control. Using an automated takedown tool provided by Hotfile, Warner Brothers used automated software crawlers based on keywords to generate legal takedown orders. This is akin to not holding the Post Office liable for what people mail, or the phone companies liable for what people say. But the flip side is that hosters must remove files when receiving a legal takedown notice from the copyright holder — even when the copyright holders themselves don't know what material they actually own."
Censorship

Film Studios Seeking Complete Block of Newzbin2 in the UK 231

Posted by Unknown Lamer from the tunisia-land-of-the-free dept.
superglaze writes "Having got BT, one of the biggest ISPs in the UK, to block the Newzbin2 Usenet site, the Motion Picture Association is now trying to get the same result from all the other major service providers in the country. As this is likely to go through, it won't be long before most people in the UK will be unable to visit file-sharing sites at all, without using a proxy, VPN, or special client."
Government

Stop Online Piracy Act Supports Blacklisting, Says EFF 73

Posted by Soulskill from the by-any-other-name dept.
hessian writes with this quote from the Electronic Frontier Foundation about the Stop Online Piracy Act: "Of course the word 'blacklist' does not appear in the bill's text — the folks who wrote it know Americans don't approve of blatant censorship. The early versions of PROTECT-IP, the Senate's counterpart to SOPA, did include an explicit Blacklist Provision, but this transparent attempt at extrajudicial censorship was so offensive that the Senate had to re-write that part of the bill. However, provisions that encourage unofficial blacklisting remained, and they are still alive and well in SOPA. First, the new law would allow the Attorney General to cut off sites from the Internet, essentially 'blacklisting' companies from doing business on the web. Under section 102, the Attorney General can seek a court order that would force search engines, DNS providers, servers, payment processors, and advertisers to stop doing business with allegedly infringing websites. Second, the bill encourages private corporations to create a literal target list—a process that is ripe for abuse."
Businesses

RIAA Lawyer Complains DMCA May Need Revamp 303

Posted by samzenpus from the still-not-enough dept.
the simurgh writes "The DMCA is just not providing the kind of protection against online piracy that Congress intended, RIAA lawyer Jennifer Pariser says. The judge in Universal Music Group's copyright suit against Veoh as well as the judge in EMI vs. MP3tunes.com issued similar findings. The courts have now determined the burden of policing the web for infringing materials is on the content owner and not the service provider. Content companies think it is unfair for them to be required to spend resources on scouring the Web when their pirated work helps service providers make money. What they complain about almost as much is that after they notify a service provider of an infringing song or movie clip and they're removed, new copies appear almost immediately. Basically they are complaining the the DMCA makes them responsible for policing their own content at their expense."
Government

1st Strikes Issued Under New Zealand Anti-Piracy Laws 123

Posted by Soulskill from the lousy-umps dept.
Master Moose writes "New Zealand's largest ISPs confirmed yesterday that they had received their first notices under the government's new copyright regime, which came into effect on September 1. All the notices received so far appear to be from the Recording Industry Association of New Zealand. Telecom, for example, received 42 notices — 35 for alleged download of songs by R&B star Rihanna, six for Lady Gaga tunes and one for British recording artist Taio Cruz. Curiously, it was the music industry, rather than the movie industry, that fired the first shot. It was believed the Motion Picture Association was keen to go after copyright infringers."
Government

PROTECT-IP Makes Its Way To the Floors of Congress 145

Posted by Soulskill from the they-call-him-bill dept.
New submitter trunicated writes "Everyone on Slashdot seems to know about PROTECT-IP Act — how it will push responsibility for the contents of the internet onto the search engines that index it, how it will give even more power to the *IAA industries, and, worst of all, how it will provide the U.S. government with a kill switch they can use at their discretion. However, this write up may provide you with a bit more information and help you explain the issues to those that won't be able to get around the poisoned DNS entries that this bill will allow."
Piracy

The Case For Piracy 318

Posted by Soulskill from the arrr-me-hearties dept.
An anonymous reader writes "A mainstream media outlet has published an article called 'The Case for Piracy. The writer shows how copyright has been hijacked by corporations and that publishers are their own worst enemies. 'One of the main reasons we all have anti-piracy slogans embedded in our brains is because the music industry chose to try and protect its existing market and revenue streams at all costs and marginalise and vilify those who didn't want to conform to the harsh new rules being set.' There's a lot in the article that Slashdot readers can relate to, and it's interesting that so many replies seem to agree with the author."
Media

SMH Outs Copyright-Violation Hunters As Porn-Pushing Brothers 80

Posted by timothy from the mixed-motives dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Media Rights Group, the company preparing mass U.S. style piracy law suits in Australia, has had its directors outed by the Sydney Morning Herald as Internet pornography kingpins Matthew and Richard Clapham. They also linked the pair to password hacking sites and a site previously being investigated by Australian authorities for its statement [to find drunk women and] 'call your friends, bring out the camera and then take turns to f### that drunk slut to a pulp.'"
Australia

Australian Government Redacts Anti-Piracy Consultation Paper 56

Posted by samzenpus from the on-second-thought dept.
First time accepted submitter coolstoryhansel writes "You might have heard the Australian Attorney-General published a consultation paper considering the implementation of a streamlined process of getting private information about subscribers from ISPs? Well perhaps not. The Attorney-General's Department have now apparently redacted that document, removing all mention of the controversial proposal, without telling anyone."
Australia

Australian Gov't To Streamline Anti-Piracy Lawsuit Process 121

Posted by timothy from the streamlining-always-looks-cool dept.
daria42 writes "Remember how the mass piracy lawsuits common in the U.S. are now coming to Australia? Of course you do. Well, now Australia's Government has come out backing the legal process which makes them possible — and is even promising to streamline it. Anti-piracy organisations will be jumping for joy — but I'm not sure how popular the move will be with the rest of the population."
Piracy

Movie Industry: Loss of Control Worse Than Piracy 360

Posted by samzenpus from the lesser-of-two-evils dept.
tlhIngan writes "Miramax CEO Mike Lang has admitted to what we all suspected. The biggest worry is a distribution monopoly, not piracy. They saw what happened to the music industry with iTunes, and vowed to not lose control and be at the mercy of Apple or whoever becomes the dominant distributor. From the article: 'Lang, whose company today debuts the Blu-Ray version of the cult classic Pulp Fiction, emphasized that people don’t necessarily want to pirate, as long as they get what they want. “Innovate or die,” should be the motive of entertainment industry companies, where it’s key to listen to customers.'"
Education

Competing Contests To Create Pro- and Anti-Piracy PSAs 220

Posted by timothy from the say-piracy-without-irony-and-you-lose dept.
An anonymous reader writes "New York City recently announced a PSA contest, in which it asked schoolkids to create a video about how evil piracy is. Techdirt found the whole marketing campaign questionable, and via some Freedom of Information Act requests, discovered the whole thing was really a propaganda front for NBC Universal. They also looked at the fine print on this 'pro-copyright' contest, and discovered that in entering, you agreed to give up your copyright. And, you were only allowed to repeat NBC Universal's talking points. Don't try suggesting that perhaps the industry should have adapted. In response, Techdirt has launched a competing video contest, where they ask people to create videos on the impact of technology on creativity. The Techdirt contest doesn't give you specific talking points, lets you present your own opinion, lets you retain the copyright on your work ... and is paying twice as much as the NYC/NBC contest."
Piracy

Anti-Piracy PI Talks About Building Cases Against File-Sharers 109

Posted by Soulskill from the full-clips-and-blank-cdrs dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Torrent Freak has an interesting interview with a former private investigator who was hired to track people who pirated software and movies. He relates some of the tactics used to make evidence more appealing to police, the media and lawmakers. He said, 'We discussed the formula for extrapolating the potential street value earnings of "laboratories" and we were instructed to count all blank discs in our seizure figures as if they were potential product. Mr. Gane also explained that the increased loss approximation figures were derived from all forms of impacts on decreasing cinema patronage right through to the farmer who grows the corn for popping.' Regarding the head of AFACT, the article notes, 'Gane understood that the media was an essential tool towards AFACT's goal of getting tougher copyright legislation in place. And for this purpose, it was a good idea to bend the truth a bit.'"
Piracy

Mass Piracy Lawsuits Come To Australia 183

Posted by timothy from the america-exports-quite-a-bit-of-some-things dept.
daria42 writes "Remember when the RIAA started sending tens of thousands of letters to Americans who it had alleged had infringed copyright online, trying to get them all to settle out of court? Yeah, good times. Well that style of mass-lawsuit has now arrived in Australia, courtesy of a new company which dubs itself the 'Movie Rights Group.' The company is currently seeking to obtain details of at least 9,000 Australians it alleges has infringed copyright on one film, and it has a number of other films in the pipeline. Sounds like a good time to know an IP lawyer."
Piracy

Dutch Usenet Provider Ordered To Remove Infringing Content 109

Posted by Soulskill from the trouble-in-the-usenets dept.
dutchwhizzman writes "Amsterdam-based Usenet wholesale provider News Service Europe has been mandated by a court to remove all copyright-infringing content on their servers, or face severe financial penalties. Dutch copyright organization BREIN has won a court case making the Usenet provider responsible for the content posted on platforms other than their own. Could this be the end of Usenet as we know it, or will an appeal be won by NSE? Why didn't the judge make the provider that allowed the posts responsible? Why didn't the judge honor the 'cancel message' procedure that technically exists in the NNTP protocol?"
Censorship

ACTA To Be Signed This Weekend 277

Posted by Soulskill from the yep-this-happened dept.
We've been following the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement for over three years, from its secretive beginnings, to the controversy and debate that followed, and to the document it eventually evolved into. Now, Japan has announced that the agreement will finally be signed on Saturday during a ceremony that follows an anti-piracy symposium on Friday. "The negotiation has been carried out among Australia, Canada, the European Union and its Member States, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, Switzerland, and the United States, and reached a general agreement at the negotiation meeting held in Japan in October 2010, followed by the completion of technical and translation work in April 2011. ... The signing ceremony will be attended by the representatives of all the participants in the ACTA negotiations, and those that have completed relevant domestic processes will sign the agreement. The agreement is open for signature until May 1, 2013."
Government

Italy Prepares '"One Strike" Anti-Piracy Law 219

Posted by samzenpus from the no-second-chances dept.
angry tapir writes "The Italian government is preparing an anti-piracy law that could ban Internet users from access after one alleged copyright infringement, a lawyer and an analyst warned. ISPs would be required to use filters against services that infringe copyright, trademark or patents under terms of the draft law. The proposed changes to Italy's e-commerce directive were drafted in July by members of parliament belonging to the Il Popolo della Libertà (PdL) party of prime minister Silvio Berlusconi."
Canada

Justification For Canadian Copyright Reform Revealed 96

Posted by Unknown Lamer from the sanity-is-forbidden dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Michael Geist has used the Canadian freedom of information act to obtain a secret ministerial document on Canadian copyright reform that provides the government position on virtually every controversial issue from last year's Bill C-32. The government has no good explanation for its DMCA approach and calls provisions requiring the destruction of course materials part of an 'essential balance.' On the U.S. piracy watch list, it says 'Canada does not recognize the validity of the Special 301 process and considers it to be flawed. The Report does not employ a clear methodology in its country ranking, as it relies on industry allegations rather than empirical evidence and analysis.'"

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